LinuxCon Program Announced: This Year’s Themes

By Amanda McPherson - May 26, 2010 - 9:53am

It’s been a hectic few months narrowing down the content for this year’s LinuxCon. Craig Ross and I have been working on this schedule for what seems like years, but we are very proud to announce it today. You can find it here[1].

I think the program has an amazing mix of business, operations and of course developer content that reflects the growing ecosystem that is Linux. I’m especially proud of the technical content that features many of the best minds behind the kernel and other upstream Linux projects. But LinuxCon is much more than just technical kernel topics: it also has content touching mobile computing, cloud and legal and business issues facing enterprise IT managers today. Linux is now becoming dominant in mobile and cloud computing so it’s no surprise LinuxCon’s content matches those themes.

So what sessions will people be talking about after LinuxCon?

Mobile. No surprise here as Linux has taken off challenging all mobile incumbents with Android, Meego, PalmOS and more. I’m looking forward to Matthew Garrett’s take[2] on the Android/Linux kernel issues and as he says, ”to take a look back at what caused the problems and how they could have been avoided - by both sides.” We also have a keynote presentation on Meego and its open approach to building a mobile project.

Wildcard. We added a healthy dose of wildcard talks this year to spice things up. From flying rockets[3] with open source to how the new generation is responding[4] to Linux development today.

Legal. We have the man himself, Eben Moglen, delivering a keynote[5] you won’t want to miss. We also have multiple sessions on everyone’s favorite topics: patents and what to do about them.

Cloud Computing. Do you want one cloud API to rule them all? They get ye to the presentation on Delta Cloud[6] from David Lutterkort. We also have a mini-summit devoted to the Open Cloud[7] on Sunday before LinuxCon which will be a deep dive into all things fluffy and white.

File Systems. Does your system have over one billion files? If so (or even if you have considerably less than that), you’ll want to hear from file system expert Ric Wheeler[8]. Heard about Btrfs? If not, you will and you should hear it directly from the source and Oracle’s Chris Mason[9].

Desktop. This may not be the year of the Linux desktop but we still have good desktop content! Matt Asay has a terrific panel[10] on Where the Linux Desktop Is Succeeding (hint: instant on is one of them), and we also have Jeff Osier-Mixon refereeing the distribution smack down[11] as he looks at common tasks across your favorite desktop distribution. Should be interesting!

I hope you join us for a great party in Boston in August. You can register here[12] before the prices go up as it gets closer.